Attendees of sport events and music concerts enjoy seeing themselves on the event site's scoreboard (“Jumbotron”). Unfortunately, they often miss the footage because it is only displayed temporarily.
Attendees of sport events and music concerts also often desire a souvenir photograph or video clip that memorialises their attendance at the event. To do so, these attendees often lug around still or video cameras, and ask a stranger to take their picture. This tends to be inconvenient, especially for the person who has to hold the camera during the entire event. Furthermore, it is not always possible to obtain the desired picture because the person holding the camera does not have it ready when an unpredictable memorable event occurs, such as a home run landing nearby, or because it was not possible to situate camera so as to capture the desired field of view.
One partial solution to these problems, commonly used in amusement parks, required that the event site assign employees to take the picture of each customer as they pass through an entrance area. The employees would then give the customer a numbered tag. Several hours later, the customer would go to a designated area, return the numbered tag, and receive the photographs. These systems, however, were labor intensive and could not provide images of the customer during unpredictable memorable events.
Another partial solution to these problems, also used in amusement parks, focused a camera at a particular location along a ride. The passing of a car would trigger the camera. These systems, however, only worked in applications where each customer would pass through a small and well-defined region, and could not respond to unpredictable memorable events. These systems also did not allow the customer to purchase the picture after they left the area.
Still another partial solution to these problems required that each guest wear a specially designed identifier badge. Cameras at the event site recorded the guests and created electronic images. Software analysed the electronic images to locate and analyse the badges, and used the resulting information to identify individuals. One drawback of these systems, however, is that they required sophisticated software to read the information on the badges. Another drawback of these systems is that they may fail if the customer is not facing the right direction or if the badge is obscured. This drawback can be a particular problem at music concerts where the seating areas are generally poorly lit. Yet another drawback of these devices they raise significant privacy concerns.
Clearly, there is a need for a simple, inexpensive system that can provide souvenir photographs to customers.